Waning Gibbous Moon
Waning Gibbous MoonImage credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio.(large image)

Waning Gibbous in Cancer

Waning Gibbous on . Illuminated surface of the Moon is 64% and getting smaller. Lunar cycle is 20 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

Moon rises in the evening and sets in the morning. It is visible to the southwest and it is high in the sky after midnight.

Upcoming main moon phases

Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.

Moon phase and lunation details

Moon in ♋ Cancer

Moon is passing about ∠16° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

6 days after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 6 days on 18 October 2013 at 23:38.

Hunter Moon before 6 days

Next Full Moon is the Beaver Moon of November 2013 after 23 days on 17 November 2013 at 15:16.

Neap tide

There is low ocean tide on this date. Sun and Moon gravitational forces are not aligned, but meet at big angle, so their combined tidal force is weak.

Apparent angular diameter ∠1768"

Lunar disc appears visually 8.8% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1930".

Lunation 170 / 1123

The Moon is 20 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 170 of Meeus index or 1123 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.51 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 12 hours and 15 minutes and it is 43 minutes longer than the upcoming lunation's length. The lengths of the following synodic months are going to decrease with the lunar orbit true anomaly getting closer to the value it has at the point of New Moon at perigee (∠0° or ∠360°).

Lunation length shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 29 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 40 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠285.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠285.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠315°.

Moon at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 14:25 about 14 days since last perigee on 10 October 2013 at 23:06 in ♐ Sagittarius the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 11 days until point of next perigee on 6 November 2013 at 09:28 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Distance to Moon 404 561 km

This apogee Moon is 404 561 km (251 383 mi) away from Earth. It is 847 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 2 148 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon after descending node

5 days after descending node on 19 October 2013 at 21:47 in ♉ Taurus the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 8 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 3 November 2013 at 06:52 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon after northern standstill

2 days since the last northern standstill on 23 October 2013 at 09:13 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠19.509° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 11 days to face maximum declination of ∠-19.511° at the point of next southern standstill on 6 November 2013 at 06:43 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

18 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 9 days

In 9 days on 3 November 2013 at 12:50 in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is going to be in a New Moon geocentric conjunction with the Sun and thus forming the next Sun-Moon-Earth syzygy alignment.

Lunar calendar

Sources and credits

Parts of this Lunar Calendar are based on Planetary Ephemeris Data Courtesy of Fred Espenak, www.Astropixels.com

Moon phase image credit to NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio, svs.gsfc.nasa.gov